Up Close and Personal
by War Lioness
Summary: A brief look at Thane's life told through a series of vignettes of hits, and one contract he never completed.
1. Chapter One: The Asari

**Up Close and Personal**

**By: War Lioness**

**Chapter One: The Asari**

**2185 – Nos Astra**

The hotel room could have been in any city, on any world in the galaxy. Only the art on the wall and the pattern of the bedspread ever changed. It was the most disconcerting aspect of the job. Eidetic memory made the rooms familiar, but the details were a jarring connection to the present.

The omni-tool on the night stand vibrated with an incoming message but the man sitting still and silent in the shadows did not interrupt his meditations. The device vibrated again and chirped once. A sigh whispered through the room as dark eyes fluttered open. With clear reluctance, he padded on silent feet to answer the call.

"Sere Krios." The voice was heavily modulated, but that was not unusual in his line of work.

"If you have this contact information, I presume you are calling for more than to simply waste my time."

"I have a job for you."

The assassin sighed. He had not advertised his services for many years and, yet, the calls still came from time to time.

"I'm listening."

**2166 – The Citadel**

She was an attractive woman, like all her species. Her crest swept back from her face in graceful curves, almost reminiscent of the scalp ridges of drell women. Her skin was a deep blue, speckled with lighter freckles and streaks, like the ocean depths on one of Kahje's rare sunny days.

He watched from the vent as she sent her assistant away on an errand and turned to the view screen on the wall to take a call.

"Matriarch T'Kolis, I assume you have received the files I sent you on the discovery at the Temple of Athame?" He recognized the asari councilor from his dossier on the mission.

His target raised the datapad she was holding. "If this information is accurate -"

"I assure you it is. I have seen the archives myself."

"Goddess, we can't allow this information to get out. We'd be forced out of the Council. At best!"

"Just so. That is why we need you to turn the tide of support on this appeal from the Illuminated Primacy, Nantria. We can't let those damn jellyfish get a foothold on Thessia."

"And that's exactly what will happen if the council approves their appeal to declare all prothean relics and ruins their heritage sights for the hanar." T'Kolis scrubbed at her face with one hand. "You're the asari representative, surely you can block the motion?"

Tevos gave the other asari a look of mild disgust. "You know I can't. I must vote according to the will of the people and right now there's a slight trend in favor of granting the request." The councilor sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. "It's a small enough majority that I could probably keep it tied up in committee for years but that damn Ambassador Felthos is surprisingly charismatic for a hanar-trained diplomat. I could almost damn the jellies for uplifting the drell. They'd have never gotten this much support if the face of the movement didn't looks much like an asari."

"I'll do what I can. I have already been able to keep support low on the boards. If I begin a fear-mongering campaign that the hanar will unreasonably restrict access to the sights and tie it in with the ongoing one that highlights advances the galaxy's made based on prothean tech. That might be enough to tip the balance. I'll talk to Alta about setting it up."

"I don't care, just get it done, and soon. I don't know how much longer I can put the vote off." Tevos ended the call and T'Koris recalled several of her assistants.

He waited, motionless in the shadows, for the flurry of activity to subside and fell into a light meditative trance. Finally the hum of orders being given, received and carried out died off and the light from outside the apartment's picture window faded as the Citadel entered its 10-hour night cycle. The last of the other asari left and he waited another half hour before cautiously removing the vent and dropping silently to the floor.

She faced away from him, gazing contemplatively at the nightscape spread out before her. She caught reflected movement and turned, perhaps thinking one of her aides had returned.

It was over in seconds.

The cartilage in her throat collapsed beneath his fist, and her arms restrained before she could think to use the mnemonics to call her biotics into play. He threw her to the floor and straddled her body, gripping chin and scalp tightly. Her eyes were wide and impossibly blue as realization dawned that her death was staring her in the face with impassive black eyes. She garbled an abortive attempt to speak as his fingers tightened and he wrenched her head until bone and cartilage gave with a wet crunch.

He did not pause to give her any last message. That was not the way of the Compact. Only death, quick and clean. The message was for her sisters. He took a moment to arrange her body and recite the prayers of thanks, of safe passage, of reconciliation.

He pulled himself back into the ducts as silently as he had left them and executed the subroutine he had inserted into the security system the day before erasing all electronic evidence of his presence in the apartment. From entrance to exit, the entire process had taken less than three minutes. He had allowed for five, in case she had had commando training not recorded in her file.

On the transport back to Kahje, it struck him. He was free. The Compact that had ruled his life nearly as long as he could remember released him on completion of this mission. He was free to marry the orange-eyed beauty who had stolen his heart that day on the plaza.

Irikah, his warrior angel. It still amazed him that she had come to return his affections. He was lost from the moment he saw her eyes flashing through the scope but she was under no similar compunction. It had taken many months for her to begin to return his affections, but even if she hadn't, she still would have left an indelible mark on his life.

He fingered the small bag in his pocket. Irikah had a fondness for a certain asari perfume. The late Matriarch Nantria T'Kolis favored the same scent. Irikah would appreciate the gift for their bonding ceremony.


	2. Chapter Two: The Krogan

**Chapter Two: The Krogan**

**2185 – Nos Astra**

"Doubtless you've heard about the Bahak system."

The assassin frowned. It was difficult not to have heard that the system, and its relay, had disappeared only a few weeks ago.

News anchors announced new updates, investigations and allegations with every broadcast. The extranet was rife with theories and speculations that ranged from the mundane – complete comm buoy failure. To the outlandish – a dead SpecTRe had destroyed the system's mass relay with a secret Council super-weapon.

"That was a result of one of our agents going off-book."

_Our agent._ That meant Cerberus. Surprising given their anti-alien leanings, but there were few organizations who could afford the considerable fee necessary to buy his direct contact information. That ruled out most of the merc companies in this part of the galaxy and the Citadel had its own assassins.

"We know you bear no love for the batarians, but an entire colony was destroyed when that relay blew. Three hundred thousand people were lost. Women, children, innocents. And this wasn't the first time this agent's gone rogue. We need you to be our insurance against anything like this happening again."

Damn them. They'd done their homework and knew exactly what direction to approach from. He considered, briefly, the possibility of a trap and concluded it was as immaterial as the possibility that he might not leave Dantius Towers alive. As long as he accomplished his mission, wiped these dark stains from the galaxy, his own death was as inconsequential as it was inevitable.

"Who is the target?"

"The Butcher of Torfan."

"An easy mark, considering Shepard's been dead for two years." His sub-vocals dropped to a near growl. He'd been ripped from his memories of Irikah for this?

"Not dead, just … indisposed."

He closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose, then named a figure high enough to make most planetary governments flinch.

"Done. She'll be on Illium soon, looking for you. Don't give her any reason not to let you on her ship."

Thane let the line hang silent a moment, vibrating with quiet fury that this coward should presume to instruct _him_. As he ended the call with an abrupt movement, it occurred to him that he was going to have to kill an information broker. No one was supposed to know he was on Illium, let alone Cerberus.

**2167 – Omega**

If the music in Afterlife was deafening on the dance floor, then it was mind numbing in the ventilation shafts. Most of the higher and middle tones of the fast-paced asari music were blocked by the intervening walls, but the bass thundered and throbbed, barely reduced, to rattle in his chest.

He peered through the grating into the private room. As his contact had promised, it was empty. It was only a moment's work to slip through the vent. He keyed his omni-tool without looking. The shaped charge that slid into his palm was a favorite of pirates and several mercenary groups, capable of putting inconvenient holes in reinforced blast doors. It should be able to put a few in one krogan.

He slipped the bomb behind the cushion of the room's largest chair and linked the detonator to his omni-tool. Now, if it came to that, he could trigger it remotely and it was tied to his vital signs. If Kalahira chose to take him into her arms this day, his family would still be provided for.

His family.

That thought pulled the corners of his lips up as he lifted himself back into his hiding place with an acrobat's unconscious grace. Irikah was heavy with their son and more radiant than ever. He would not have left so close to her time had he not seen the medical bills that had accrued over her pregnancy. His job as a menial laborer could not begin to pay them off, and Irikah had been forced to take a sabbatical from the university after some early complications.

He had been reluctant to seek out his old contacts until the day he had returned home early and found those sunset eyes filled with tears as she tried to explain to the bill collector that they _were_ paying everything they could. After that, it had been a matter of days before he had a job. That first hit had helped ease the pressure, but, as the pregnancy progressed, there were more complications. Tests, hospital visits and medications, they all added up.

He had sworn to Irikah he would go back to the plant as soon as the baby was born. As that time drew nearer, this last assassination would bring in enough to pay the last of the bills and give them a nice cushion besides. He always overcharged for krogan.

Below, the door hissed open and a lithe asari dancer entered, followed closely by his target. Shanix was small for a krogan, his hump withered and misshapen, as though some large beast had gnawed on it until it was soft, then left it out to dry in Tuchanka's harsh sunlight. His small size might have encouraged a less experienced assassin, but thane took in the network of scars that traced across the krogan's exposed skin knew better than to underestimate someone who had survived what appeared to have been a point blank shot to the face from a high powered shotgun.

The dossier said the former Weyrloc strategist had been disowned by his clan for mutilating females who turned down his advances. It was a death sentence that followed him for years before finally catching up in one of Aria's back rooms.

The giggling asari backed out, promising to return soon with more drinks. Her eyes flickered briefly to the room's ductwork and Thane cursed the necessity of bringing an outsider in on a job like this. Shanix caught the glance and turned toward the new threat. But the girl had looked at the wrong vent, and all the movement did was put the krogan in a better position for the assassin's attack.

With a whisper of leather on metal, Thane dropped onto his target, smashing his fists into Shanix's eye ridges. He slid between the blinded krogan's rising arms and struck, lightning fast, at the nerve cluster in his throat and the secondary node, leaving Shanix frozen and staring. Thane had heard a human expression about looking like a stunned ox. He imagined the ox and the krogan wore similar expressions.

A sharp kick to the quad put Shanix's head in perfect position. Thane gripped both sides tightly and called his biotics into play with a thought, using them to augment his momentum as he leapt and spun to generate the torque necessary to separate vertebrae and sever the spinal cord. When he landed, light and silent, Shanix was still looking at the ceiling, his head twisted nearly backwards. The damage was too much for even a krogan's regenerative ability to repair.

The girl in the doorway was no longer giggling as she watched the assassin retrieve his bomb and set to returning it to its component parts. Flinty violet eyes regarded him a moment, then she nodded towards the door, a clear dismissal from Aria's envoy. He inclined his head in return and slipped into the deserted hall.


	3. Chapter Three: The Batarian

_**TRIGGER WARNING: DESCRIPTION OF TORTURE!**_

**Chapter Three: The Batarian**

**2185 – Nos Astra**

The rattle of gunfire drew the guards below away from the door. Shepard was catching up, putting pressure on him to be better, faster. He hadn't been challenged like this since his early days as an independent agent.

He watched her direct the turian. Vakarian his memory provided, formerly of Citadel Security , and the elderly salarian, Mordin Solus. She was good, playing to their strengths. They flowed along burying Nassana's hired muscle under the wave of her determination.

It was fascinating.

He knew she was after him, his Cerberus contact had as much as said they were sending her to find him. But he had another mission to complete. The Dantius commission was not just a convenient cover to allow him admission to Shepard's crew; it was a job he had been researching and planning for two years. He would not leave it unfulfilled to begin a new mission just because a new employer presented itself. The corrupt asari had to die, and so he allowed himself to be pushed, riding Shepard's wave like a Kahje psaltin, not guiding, but taking the gift Kalahira presented.

Later, with Illium's setting sun painting the penthouse in bloody light, he met the force of nature face to face.

Shepard looked nothing like the holos attached to her dossier. A lattice of angry, glowing scars marred her features. They made her seem fierce and otherworldly, a figure from legend.

"Is there anything we can do to help you?"

He had informed her of the illness that shortened his breath, and this delicate concern from the figure in gore crusted armor disarmed him for a moment. Nothing in the dry Alliance reports and Cerberus intelligence memos had indicated this aspect of her personality. He waved the question away with a trite explanation and filed the information away to review later.

When finally the deal was struck, he found himself following her back to her ship with an uncharacteristic eagerness to learn more about the contradictory woman.

**2178 – Seven Stars Mercenary Dreadnaught Bahktan's Last Laugh – Degrading orbit of Dirada**

He did not know if it was hubris or desperation that kept the Seven Stars newest – and last – commander talking long past the point where stoic silence would have been more prudent, but he carried on nonetheless. Even after losing the third eye and most of his teeth.

"She cried for you," Keltarn Vronik had not had a pleasant voice to begin with and being thick with his own blood did nothing to improve it. "Even as we cut her to pieces, she still believed you would come. She died thinking you would walk through the door at any moment to save her."

It was an admirable attempt to elicit an emotional reaction that might shorten his suffering, Thane thought as he regarded the selection of implements before him. He lifted and examined several before settling on a short handled sledge hammer normally used to pound out minor dents in shuttle exteriors. A pity the batarian didn't realize all his softer emotions had died with his wife.

"I believe I will begin with your feet." His voice was almost conversational as he approached the form bound upright against a medical table. "Irikah had such lovely feet."

He began to recite the fourteenth prayer to Kalahira's hidden face as he began, timing his swings, and the mercenary leader's screams, to the rhythm of the chant. It was an old custom, ancient really, to call on the Lady of Storms to exact seven-fold justice on one who had wronged you, a rite nearly forgotten in this age of space travel and alien intervention.

But he was a follower of the old ways, and this broken man was the last in a long line that stretched back to Kahje and a red door in a quiet neighborhood.

Hours later he checked the life support machines in the medical bay. They would keep Vronik alive, barely, and wake him in time for the ship's final descent into Dirada. He would be alive as the compromised shields began to fail and, slowly, inch by inch, allow solar radiation to bathe the derelict and all of its contents.

Thane felt the last of his rage dissipate as he piloted his shuttle away from the larger craft, leaving him feeling hollowed out and increasingly numb. He felt his soul separate from his body and welcomed the dissociation. Let it join his Irikah until his skills finally failed him, and they met again across the sea. Until that day, he would use those skills to brighten the galaxy as she had brightened his life.

* * *

A/N: A million and one thanks to my beta, quietonewisp. Without her this story would have never even gotten off the ground.


	4. Chapter Four: The Turian

**Chapter Four: The Turian**

**2185 – The Citadel**

Harsh fluorescent lights revealed every detail of his son's stony face. Echoes of Irikah stared back at him from across the plain metal table in the plain C-Sec office. It had been that resemblance that had stunned him – a man whose survival regularly hinged on his ability to act quickly– into inaction in Talid's apartment. Had it not been for Shepard's intervention, he would have let Kolyat slip away again. He would not allow this opportunity to pass.

The silence stretched taut between them. Thane sighed and looked at his hands, clasped loosely before him. This angry young man was so different from the child he'd left behind on Kahje. He opened his mouth to say something, anything, to break the impasse, but Kolyat spoke first.

"Why are you here?"

"Because you are." The answer slipped from him without conscious thought. Kolyat sneered at him.

"You weren't there before, how are things any different now?"

"I am different."

Kolyat snorted. "Yeah, right." He leaned back and crossed his arms. The leather of his jacket pulled over broad shoulders, and Thane felt the sharp pain of having missed when the fragile young boy he had left on Kahje had transformed into this powerful man. "Because you're, what, dying? I think your Cerberus friend would call that bullshit."

The assassin drew a long breath in through his nose and held it for a slow five count. His lungs burned as he exhaled.

"I deserve that," he said finally. "That and much, much, more. I abandoned you, after your mother's death."

"You abandoned us long before that! I can't remember a time when you didn't put your incoming messages, your _hits_, before us. You weren't there to see the way she shut down when you left." The dam had broken. A river of words flowed from Kolyat, thick and fast, and his voice broke on the rocks of his emotion. "She was happier, _we_ were happier with you there than anything your money could buy."

The words drove a spike of pain through Thane, the ache of body and soul reunited for the first time since Irikah died. Shepard had brought the two halves of his self closer to each other than they had been in years with her curiosity and conversation. But it was the anguish in his son's eyes that bridged the final gap.

"I know." Thane bowed his head under the weight of his guilt. "There is no excuse, no explanation that can justify what I did to you and your mother. And there is no way I can make up for what you lost both when your mother died, and after."

He finally met his son's eyes and, regardless of the differences, it was like seeing Irikah for the first time all over again. He fought the subsumation that came with that memory. Kolyat did not need to be reminded of how his parents met. He needed his father.

"However, if you will allow me, I would like to try."

**2179 – Cipritine**

The instant he stepped off the transport, he felt his lungs tighten and his breath shorten. The doctors said it was too early in the disease's progression for him to notice any effects, but he had been honing his body into a weapon for nearly three decades. It had been the hitch and rasp of his breath that had driven him back to Kahje and its doctors. They had only confirmed the death sentence he had been suspecting for some time.

It was fitting that he, who had brought swift and sudden death to so many, should die gasping.

He pulled the hood of his cloak higher, hiding his features in its depths. Drell were still not common enough in the galaxy for one to pass unremarked, even in populous cities with highly transient, multi-species populations. Cipritine was none of those things, though it did host a hanar embassy that would provide him with some cover.

A summit of primarchs was being held, giving him a window of opportunity on a target he'd been hunting for over a year. The assassination of Altakiril's Primarch Livia Maxil at a diplomatic function would prompt a massive investigation that would not only reveal Maxil's deep ties to mercenaries, slavers and warlords, but also the branches of a web of corruption that spread from Palaven, to the Citadel, to Omega and the Terminus Systems. He hoped that, as one would tease out an Earth arachnid, plucking this thread would reveal the shape of the Shadow Broker. Thane had long ago given up any hope of retribution against the being who had sold his home address to the stars, but that did not mean he wouldn't pass by an opportunity to make life difficult for him.

The assassin slipped into a back entrance to the embassy and found the uniform left for him in a supply closet. He spotted his target hours later when the function was in full swing. Her silvery plates and vibrant red colony markings made her noticeable in any crowd. He slipped through the dignitaries like smoke and presented his tray of alcoholic beverages, all liberally laced with fentharra berry extract. It was a harmless compound to most turians, but an allergen for Maxil, comparable to mild lactose intolerance in humans.

He moved on easily, circulating through the room until his tray was empty. He dropped it off in the kitchen and melted into the background, all but disappearing into the mass of servers, cooks, cleaning staff and event coordinators. He picked up a broom and dustpan and strode out of the kitchen. The secret to blending in in any busy facility was to look and act like you belonged there.

His timing, as always, was perfect. The keynote speaker had just taken the stage when Maxil began to feel the effects of the fentharra. The halls surrounding the event room were deserted save for himself, and the slim turian rushing to the restroom. She paid no attention to him as he paced down the hall toward her, noticing only his uniform and dismissing him as a threat.

Sloppy.

He set the broom and dustpan aside as he drew closer. Maxil was peering at the placards on doors, searching for the toilet. Faster than any eye could follow, he snapped both fists at the red marked plates beneath her eyes, blinding and stunning her. He followed up by bringing his right elbow down hard on her collar bone and sweeping her legs from under her. He gripped her short fringe and wrenched her neck around vaulting over her falling body.

When he was sure of the kill, he placed an optical storage disk with the evidence that formed a trail of breadcrumbs for Hierarchy investigators to follow. It would lead them to the edges of Maxil's corrupt dealings.

He picked up the items he'd stolen from the kitchen and calmly made his way back to the same storage room he'd found the uniform in. It wasn't long before he was on yet another transport.

As the shuttle broke atmosphere, he opened his omni-tool and keyed a brief message to Reyya, including a passcode for an account he'd set up for Kolyat. Irikah's sister had mentioned that Kolyat had hit another growth spurt and was in need of new clothing. Thane sighed and allowed himself to slip into a brief memory of happier times with his family.

It had only been a year since Irikah's death, the Seven Stars no longer existed, and he could go back to his son. Reyya had hinted often enough that Kolyat missed him. But that was impossible at this point. He had entered a battlesleep. A dissociated father was worse than no father at all.


	5. Chapter Five: The Human

**Chapter Five: The Human**

**2185 – Omega**

The hotel room was of the same anonymous type as could be found anywhere in the galaxy. It was nowhere near as luxurious as Shepard's cabin on the _Normandy_, but still among the better lodgings on the station. With the ship in for critical repairs, they had chosen to stay on Omega.

A sigh whispered through the dimly lit room. Dark eyes flickered open and settled on the form spread in sated slumber on the bed. The contrast between her dark skin and the white sheets was striking enough to make him thankful for his race's enduring memory.

His omni-tool vibrated on the nightstand and Shepard sighed, shifting position as she slept. It was a testament to the depths of her exhaustion that she did not wake. Soldiers were notoriously light sleepers. He padded, nude and silent, to answer the call before it did wake her.

"We are activating your contract."

It was the same modulated voice that had contacted him on Illium. Had he been human and unused to sorting a variety of vocal tones, or never heard the Illusive Man's unaltered voice, he would not have been able to identify the speaker. He glanced at the somnolent form across the room again. This time, he took in the bruises, burns and abrasions she had acquired on the collector base. Her dusky skin was even darker on her right shoulder. She had dislocated it arresting his uncontrolled slide down the falling platform.

Their budding relationship had blindsided him. After her actions on the Citadel, he began truly warming to her. He looked forward to their daily conversations, and found himself deliberately using provocative language to answer her questions. He had listened as well. Her explanation of the events in the Bahak system had illuminated a great many things Cerberus had, he suspected, intentionally obscured. In addition, her behavior on Aite and treatment of David Archer had painted shades of grey in the black and white portrait he had gotten from this man.

"No."

"We look forward to receiving conf—What?"

"No. Our contract was invalidated when evidence came to light that contradicted the information you provided on Shepard's apparent perfidy."

"You don't want to do that Sere Krios. We have resources you can't imagine, and your son isn't hard to find."

The assassin's voice cracked like arctic ice across the light years separating him from his erstwhile employer. "I would think very carefully before I followed that plan of action, were I you. You have access to my file. I may not have limitless resources, but do not mistake me for a common soldier. What I do have is a very specific set of skills. Skills I have honed over a lifetime. Skills that would make it inadvisable for you to pursue that line of action. If my son comes to any harm, I will hunt you across this galaxy and through dark space. There will be no sanctuary for you, no safe haven. I will find you and I will make you wish for death and nothing your vast resources can purchase will be able to stop me."

**2185 – Galactic Core, beyond the Omega 4 Relay**

She was poetry in motion—load, fire, advance, reload—a symphony in four movements. The altered protheans fell before her like sea grass before a storm surge. His memories of the hours leading up to the assault waited behind the barrier of the present for him to slip back into their warm embrace. The image of her head thrown back in ecstasy, back bowed and breasts thrust up toward the impassive stars vied with her inexorable advance, lit by muzzle flashes and the reflection of the Justicar's biotics for dominance.

He knew he had forsaken the Cerberus contract when he told her of his wife's death. Reconnection of body and soul is a painful process, but she stood as a strong breakwater against the storms, weathering them and protecting him as he rebuilt himself from the scraps that had survived his battle sleep.

When he stood before her door, unsure of himself for the first time since he'd caught sight of sunset eyes through his scope, he had prayed to the gods for strength. Baring your very soul to another was always a proposition fraught with danger. And he bared everything. His nascent relationship with Shepard could not survive or grow if the shadow of his true reasons for joining her crew were not revealed and exorcized.

Even with her acceptance, he was surprised when she chose him to be at her back. Not once, but twice, he and Vakarian followed her shooting star through the base. It had been some time since he cared whether or not he survived a mission. They raced through corridors and rooms, and he reveled in the euphoria of the hunt, echoing his warrior angel.

The snake in the garden reared its head when, somehow, The Illusive Man reached through the relay to test Shepard. Thane stood, ramrod straight and with tension tingling in every muscle, behind the woman he loved and watched her. He saw some of that tension echoed in the muscles of her slender, human neck, that column of flesh and bone that could be so easily broken. And yet, it never wavered, never bowed. Shepard stood defiant, chin high and eyes flashing as she severed, brutally and totally, her ties to Cerberus. Both of them noticed the flicker of those glowing eyes to the drell over her left shoulder, and knew the call was coming.

Anxiety thrummed through him but he kept his impassive mask in place. He would not reveal his own ties before the turian unless forced. The situation was too fragile to withstand an internal stand-off, they must present a united face to their foe. It was a relief when Shepard cut the connection before The Illusive Man could attempt to cash in his marker.

Thane had a million opportunities, after that moment, to complete his contract. She knew it and still stepped into his reach, still flung herself through the void, trusting him to catch her. Later, in her cabin as the ship limped its way to Omega and the sweat of their lovemaking dried on her skin, she turned amber eyes on him.

"I never doubted you."


	6. Chapter Six: The Cyborg

**Chapter Six: The Cyborg**

**2186 –Citadel Presidium**

He forced his legs to keep moving through the burn of oxygen deprived muscles. Each breath scraped like a live wire down his throat, searing his compromised lungs and fogging his brain with exhaustion. Already his fingers and hands were tingling, and he'd lost some of the dexterity that had garnered such high scores in the Compact training program. He cursed as he botched the hack on the boutique door for the third time.

This section of the markets was blessedly free of Cerberus operatives for the moment. That wouldn't last long. He needed to get off the streets. The lock finally chimed access and he slipped inside. He took a moment to catch his ragged breath and flicked his omni-tool on, hoping against hope someone—the _Normandy_ was due any day—was outside the Citadel and could provide assistance.

/_Citadel traffic control, this is the _Normandy_ requesting clearance. Please respond._/

Thane had never been so happy to hear that cantankerous voice as he was at that moment. Briefly he outlined the situation to Shepard. He could imagine the orange flash deep in those amber eyes to match the sudden steel in her voice. He remembered the first time he'd seen that flash. It had been when they were chasing after his son. That fire had kindled in her eyes when he had spoken of using the dra'fala for his hits.

It wasn't much later that he learned of her youth on Earth. Her dossier had been distressingly thin on her life before the Alliance. She confessed to him that Mouse's throw away statement—that the assassin had always done right by him—had been the one thing that kept her from walking away from him. It had not occurred to him until then to consider the effect his actions had on the people he used.

He dodged keepers as he ran swiftly and silently through the maintenance shafts. His lungs burned and his head buzzed with the exertion. This, more than all of the medical reports on lung capacity or blood oxygen saturation levels, brought home to him that he was in his final days. He found himself staring at a directional sign for several minutes, completely incapable of making sense of the simple infographic.

This was why he had turned down Shepard's offer to join her: this mental fog that descended from time to time and more frequently during physical exertion. It turned him from an asset to a liability. He had underplayed just _how_ sick he was when she asked. There had been a moment during their reunion when he had forgotten her given name. It had come to him a moment later, but the very fact that he _could not recall_ her name still sent chills down his spine. How much else had he forgotten without realizing?

Finally, he wrestled sense from the map and began moving toward C-Sec headquarters again. It was only a matter of moments before he achieved his goal.

Too late.

Shepard's voice echoed through the cavernous space, distorting her words and whatever reply she was getting was lost. Cautiously, he leaned out to assess the situation. As always, Shepard was protecting another. A siha was always throwing herself into danger for others. He saw his opening.

Since his decline, he had lost much of the strength he had once boasted. He could not guarantee a kill with his usual, hands-on approach. The pistol felt heavy, wrong in his hand, but it was the only weapon he had been able to scavenge in his headlong race. He rushed forward. The pistol was not yet ready to fire when he raised it.

Sloppy.

The Cerberus assassin was strong, stronger than he should be. And fast. His grotesquely altered face stretched in a leer as he recognized the drell, confirming Thane's suspicion that he had been specifically named a target in this attack. It seemed the past was finally catching up to him.

His biotics were weak, and what power he could summon left him winded and reeling. A Compact novice would have been able to exploit the openings in his guard as he breathed, air like ground glass in his throat. His sight picture wobbled and jumped as he charged the other assassin, firing wildly. It was impossible to expect any accuracy at this point. All he hoped was to buy his warrior angel a chance to evacuate the councilor. He prayed she took action.

The blade entered his body like air, like breath before the disease. It was not until his opponent's leer shifted into a satisfied smirk that he noted the pain, distantly, as thunder from an onrushing storm.

Sensation crashed over him when the blade as it withdrew. A lifetime of training allowed him to catalogue his injuries as he fell. The sword had missed his lungs but likely perforated his stomach and liver. Thankfully, it had missed his spine completely. He only allowed himself a moment to feel the pain before compartmentalizing it and pushing it away.

Thane's vision tunneled as blood poured from his wounds. He heard the thunder of a weapon, his own, before fading into insensibility. He responded vaguely to Shepard's concerned look. He had not killed the Cerberus dog, but the councilor still lived. All in all a good mission to end on.

He closed his eyes and leaned back against the wall.

The sound of the sea echoed in his ears.

**2186 – Cronos Station**

She rolled through the Cerberus base like a force of nature. A tidal wave of destruction. There was no obstacle they could throw at her that did more than slow her inexorable advance. Behind her visor, the orange of her eyes would have brought to mind childhood stories of devils and demons made flesh, had any humanity remained in the "upgraded" defenders.

He was here.

She could feel it in her carbon fiber reinforced bones. He had narrowly escaped her fury on Horizon. And after Thessia, and his boastful, self-satisfied message, her rage was towering. It crackled in her veins and burned below her skin in bright lines of fire. Leng would not leave this station alive.

She barely registered the videos EDI showed her. Death beat a drumbeat in her ears and her footsteps, her heartbeat, her weapon kept time. The proto-reaper sickened her, but only confirmed her suspicions. The impact of seeing the great, metal skeleton did nothing but spur her on. The drum kept beating.

She smiled a wide, feral smile when the Illusive man sprang his trap. _This_ was why she came. Beyond the needs of the greater galaxy, outside the progress of the war, she was here for the inevitable "twist" Cerberus would throw at her. She knew EDI could recover the necessary information from the prothean VI. This fight was what kept her going through Rannoch, Thessia, Omega, the Leviathan operation and of the inane side missions. Her smile grew wider when the assassin sauntered in. He didn't seem to notice.

He was noticing now.

Phantoms and Nemeses tumbled before her like leaves in an autumn wind. They fell to her teammates fire as she stalked the assassin. Her face stretched in a rictus, a savage baring of teeth, as exhaustion began to take its toll. A phantom blocked Shepard's advance. In a move more reminiscent of her drell lover, her hand flashed out to grip the other woman by the throat. She brought her rarely used shotgun to bear and emptied it in the blank faceplate.

The ground trembled beneath her feet, as he trembled before her.

"You're right," she ground out as she knelt on his chest, weapons discarded in favor of a more primitive, hands-on approach. "This is better than Thessia, much more personal."

A final blow rendered her love's murderer insensible.

"Don't get up."

She knew he wouldn't listen. It wasn't in his nature—his programming—to be prudent. It was, she'd once been told, the difference between an amateur and a professional assassin. She felt nothing as her blade slid home in his gut, though her voice dripped venom. She was a machine. Her purpose was to end the war. She heard waves in the faint static of the comm. channel.

**Epilogue **

**2186 – The Crucible**

She tasted copper and steel.

It was done.

For better or worse, the die was cast and she could only hope the decision had been the right one. She felt the Crucible respond. Unimaginable power thrummed through the deck plates beneath her feet.

Her consciousness spun away into the light, images of friends, family and loved ones fading in her mind's eye.

_Thane …_

Vision gone, she smelled briny water, felt hot sand beneath her feet, heard the crash of waves.

_Siha …_


End file.
